After being held for six days by the Israeli army, Dr Zaheera Soomar returns to Sharjah, exhausted but determined. The South African activist, who joined the Global Sumud Flotilla to break Gaza's siege , told Khaleej Times the ordeal has only strengthened her resolve to fight for Palestinian justice and freedom.

The Sharjah-based mother of three was deported to South Africa on Monday and arrived in the UAE Tuesday morning. As the other activists were deported via flights, Soomar said her and other South Africans were being withheld and were the last group to leave the Israeli cells.

“We were the last batch to be kept. We were a bit fearful that we were still going to be there on October 7, and we didn't know if they might make an example out of us by being there,” she explained.

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However, the next day the group was released. Soomar said the group didn't immediately fly out from Israel to their home countries, like the other activists.“They dropped us just over the border in Jordan and our consulate services had to come pick us up,” she said. The next day, Soomar landed in South Africa, and was once more reunited with her mother and siblings.

Israeli interception

During her six-day detention , Soomar said she and other women were held in“crowded cells, sometimes denied access to consular officials, and handled aggressively by guards”.

“There were moments where I feared for my life,” she said.“Even if your body was taking a beating, your mind had to stay strong.”

When Soomar first announced that she would be joining the Global Sumud Flotilla , her mother was not too happy about the decision. Once the activist set sail, however, she said she had made peace with it but still struggled when the mission was intercepted by Israeli forces.“There was no communication. So, no one had verified that we are okay, we are alive or anything like that. I think that those days were probably the hardest for [my family],” she stated.

Before joining the mission, Soomar had already spent years advocating for Palestinan rights.“I've been someone who's been working in the Palestinian movement for over a decade. I also grew up in apartheid in South Africa. And so fighting for justice, freedom, equality, equity, is something that I grew up with. But it's also something that's central to the kind of the work that I do from a professional perspective,” she said.

Professionally a business executive and a professor, Soomar spends her time between the UAE and Canada, where she previously lived.

While impactful, she said that it hasn't been able to produce results quick enough, which is why she decided to embark along with hundreds of other activists on the Global Sumud Flotilla.

The Global Sumud Flotilla is a civilian maritime mission of international activists, which set sail in late September to deliver humanitarian aid and challenge Israel's blockade of Gaza. The vessels were intercepted in early October by Israeli naval forces before reaching the enclave.

Although a ceasefire was announced last week, Soomar said that she is sceptical of it. In the terms laid out in the ceasefire agreement, signed by Hamas and Israel and brokered by US President Donald J. Trump, all fighting is to be ceased, and aid must enter substantially to feed the starving Gazan population.

And yet, Israel announced on Tuesday that it is restricting aid, and that no fuel or gas supplies will enter the strip.

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